At least 25 people were killed and 33 injured in a deadly stampede at the Laferrière Citadel, a UNESCO World Heritage site in northern Haiti, during an annual cultural celebration on Saturday. Authorities have arrested eight people in connection with the incident, including five local police officers, two employees of Haiti's National Heritage Preservation Institute (ISPAN), and the mayor of Milot, the town where the citadel is located.
The gathering drew large numbers of young people, reportedly after a local DJ or influencer promoted the event on social media platforms including TikTok. The citadel's mayor, Wesner Joseph, said his administration had no prior knowledge of any planned activity at the site that day. According to the site's engineer and former ISPAN director Jean-Hérold Pérard, one of the two entrances to the citadel had been closed so that security officials could collect entry fees, creating a dangerous bottleneck. When heavy rain began to fall, panic set in among the crowd. Pérard alleged that gunshots were fired into the air and tear gas was deployed — though it remains unclear by whom — causing people to push against one another. The most common cause of death was asphyxiation.
The arrested individuals remain in custody pending further legal proceedings. Haiti's chief prosecutor for Cap-Haïtien, the region's main city, stated that the mayor bore particular responsibility, saying he "should have known the site's capacity and controlled the number of visitors." Prime Minister Alix Didier Fils-Aimé announced three days of national mourning beginning Tuesday.
Citadelle Laferrière, also known as Citadelle Henry, was built by revolutionary leader Henri Christophe shortly after Haiti declared independence from France in the early nineteenth century. The fortress, which took more than a decade to construct, was designed to defend the young nation against potential invasion and remains a powerful symbol of Haitian sovereignty and resilience.
The tragedy underscores the fragility of public safety infrastructure in Haiti, a country already struggling with pervasive gang violence that has claimed thousands of lives in recent years. The incident raises urgent questions about crowd management and official accountability at major cultural and heritage events, particularly those amplified rapidly through social media with little institutional oversight.